not so certain about that,” Quinn said.
“But I don’t even have to talk!”
“Perhaps, but your role is the most important.” Elle stamped snow off her boots. She was wearing a worn blue skirt with a dark green shawl, which was mostly covered by her traveling cloak. “You’ve got to convince them you’re a mage.”
“Please, I’m just a puppet. Puss will be doing the magic for me.” Gabrielle made a noise in the back of her throat, then uncomfortably twisted her head to glance at Puss, who was crouched on her shoulder. “What do you think, Puss? Are you ready?”
Puss twitched his whiskers. “Please,” he scoffed. “Fooling these buffoons will be the merest child’s play. They don’t even have any listening spells set up on the grounds—just a few weak alarms.”
“If we botch things up, I can use my magic,” Angelique said. “But we’d like to avoid that because we’ll notify the entire Chosen network that we know this place exists. It’d be better for Severin and his men to quietly take them out and catch them unaware.”
Angelique chewed on her lip and tried to ignore the ball of nerves building in her gut.
This is the best chance I’ve had in a long time at learning more about Evariste. Will I actually uncover anything helpful? Or will this be just another dead end?
Quinn rested a hand on Angelique’s shoulder. “We can handle this.” She looked comfortable in her clothes. Playing the part of the guard, she was wearing a tunic with a leather doublet, a sword belt, arm guards, and leather pauldrons. “We’re just making ourselves known and trying to get a layout of the place.”
That was the plan—to make two trips in their disguises. The first visit would give them the opportunity to see inside the building—something the Loire ranger, as talented as they are, had been unable to accomplish—and assess the situation. It was during the second trip that they’d make their move and snoop.
“Right, then. Ladies—and gentle-cat—shall we?” Elle’s green eyes practically glowed with mischief and excitement.
Gabrielle adjusted the hood of her cloak. “Lead on.”
“So it begins.” Puss flicked his tail back and forth before he activated an advanced invisibility charm. His form shimmered for a moment before he faded entirely from view.
Given that he was a cat, Puss didn’t have a magical signature the way Angelique or any other mage would, but the second charm he activated was a basic magic-misdirection spell, which made magic hang in the air around him…and Gabrielle, who was disguised as their employer and a mage.
Elle put on a pair of rudimentary eye glasses that had thick metal frames and winked before she set off. The air around her entirely changed as she took on the role as the most trusted servant of mage-Gabrielle. She even changed how she walked so it was more of a shuffling, half- bent gait, and her black hair was pulled back in an almost scholarly bun and covered with a yellowed handkerchief. She had to furrow her brow a little to keep the glasses in place, which gave her more wrinkles and aged her by a few years.
Gabrielle followed behind her, her skirts sweeping and her chin lifted high as she raised the fan to cover the lower half of her face. Her role of lady mage was an effortless fit—she had a natural grace to her that was only complimented by the social training she’d received when she became Crown Princess of Arcainia. Though Puss provided the air of magic around her, Gabrielle made it believable by the confidence she held, and the hint of danger to her posture. (That danger was the instincts of an accomplished and deadly swordswoman, not a mage, but the Chosen likely wouldn’t be able to tell the difference, particularly with Puss’s spell hanging around her.)
Quinn and Angelique followed behind. Elle had opted to give them less flashy roles, because—when given the chance—they’d be able to fade in the background and hopefully search the premises.
Quinn was especially convincing as a guard—and her stealth training as a Farset soldier made her particularly easy to overlook.
(“You’ll need roles as close to your reality as possible—it’s what will make the act extra convincing,” Elle had explained the day she fitted everyone to their roles.)
Angelique was also dressed as a guard (“We have to explain that dangerous edge of yours somehow!”). But, unlike Quinn, she was wearing a full helm that obscured her unusual silver-colored eyes, and Elle had padded her tunic with extra